With Two Years of Mobilized Service, Do I Qualfiy for the Post 9/11 GI Bill?

Greetings, I served 8 years on active duty in the Air Force and another 15 years in the Reserves. My Air Force Reserve unit was activated from March 2003 to March of 2005. I retired from the Air Force Reserves in June of 2005. Am I eligible for any Post 9/11 GI Bill educational benefits that could be transferred to my college age daughters? Thanks.

A: As far as transferring the Post 9/11 GI Bill it to your daughters, that is a no-go. The way Congress wrote the Post 9/11 GI Bill rules, the servicemember had to be of the Armed Forces “on or after 1 August 2009″ in order to make a transfer request.

If your two years of active duty were on a Title 10 contingency operation order, then yes you do qualify for the Post 9/11 GI Bill entitlement at the 80% level. If your active duty time was under 24 months, then you would qualify at the 70% level.

One issue which you did not mention was if you had the Montgomery GI Bill (MGIB) from your 8 years of active duty or the Montgomery GI Bill – Selected Reserve(MGIB-SR) from your reserve time. Under the Rule of 48, you are limited to a combined maximum of 48 months of GI Bill benefits, if you qualify for multiple GI Bills.

If you had either of the two GI Bills, and never used them, or you never had either one, then you should have 36 months of Post 9/11 GI Bill entitlement.

If you had either one and used some months of entitlement, then you will get the same number of months of Post 9/11 GI Bill entitlement as the number of months you had left.

If you had either GI Bill, and used up your 36 months of entitlement, then you would most likely only get 12 additional months of Post 9/11 GI Bill benefit. If you had either of the MGIB GI Bills, then only the VA could tell you exactly what you have left for benefits.

So you are most likely eligible for some months Post 9/11 GI Bill benefits for yourself, however you will not be able to transfer any of it to your daughters. Sorry!